


Sorry

by chrysalisdreams



Series: Five Scenes that Could Have Happened in TBEA (And One That Did Not) [3]
Category: Tangled (2010), Tangled: The Series (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Headcanons about their sex life, Tangled Before Ever After, five things, very mild bathroom humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-02
Updated: 2017-05-02
Packaged: 2018-10-26 10:13:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10784772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chrysalisdreams/pseuds/chrysalisdreams
Summary: Rapunzel sits in the rowboat, thinking about the mistakes of her day, until Eugene arrives.





	Sorry

Rapunzel wanted to be by herself and at the same time wanted company. Being alone, without even Pascal, sitting in the row boat as it bobbed beside the dock, felt like what she deserved for the day's failures. She had tried to do and say the right thing, but when the time came, each time she managed to do something else to embarrass her father on a day she knew was important to him.

They were _so nice_ to her anyway. She told them she was sorry and they smiled at her. Her mother patted her arm. They were both so perfect, so serene and composed, like royalty should be. Like Rapunzel was not.

She didn’t remember taking off her shoes before the ceremony started. She didn’t realize she had taken off her shoes until the duchess with the tall wig had pointed it out. Rapunzel had truly been excited -- nervous, but wasn’t that the same thing? -- to meet each new person. “Not enough to wear shoes,” the duchess had said, and Rapunzel felt terrible that the aristocrat thought so. None of the important visitors had approved of her efforts. She wanted to apologize to each of them again. The problem was, she wasn’t sure what to be sorry for.

She had tried. She was trying. She could hear Gothel’s voice in her head, echoes of all the times Rapunzel had been reminded that she wasn’t especially good at anything, that she wasn’t very smart, that she was always awkward. She was sitting alone in the little boat in the dark, telling herself that Gothel had lied about a lot of things in order to keep Rapunzel in the tower. She was trying to believe that in spite of today, Gothel had been wrong.

She hugged her knees and sighed. It was another nice night. The air was still warm from the heat of the day, and the breezes over the water were cool, not chilly. The stars were out, and the sky looked so big. She contemplated untying the boat and lying down to look up at the stars and bright moon, but while she had picked up a dozen new hobbies in the last six months, rowing had not been one of them.

If her hair had still been long, she could have tied the end to the dock, and pulled herself back in when she needed to. Her fingers found a wisp of her hair and tugged at the short, brown strand, curling the hairs around her finger until she felt the ends. What she need to do, she told herself, was to learn how to use a boat so that next time, she would know how.

She thought she had learned _so much_ since the day Eugene had climbed into her tower. She had learned about the cuisine of other kingdoms, about tea and distillations and cheeses. She had her own flower and vegetable beds in the castle gardens, she had made vases to put the flowers in. She was learning to play the flugelhorn, the euphonium, and a game called badminton. She loved all of it, there was still so much more to learn, and yet she found herself looking through her spyglass at the distance. She raced out to the Corona Wall each morning, climbed to the height, and looked outward. All her life, she had been looking at the view. She was sorry to seem ungrateful for the wonderful things she already had, but she couldn’t stop feeling drawn to the horizon.

She was aware of Eugene a moment before he spoke. Her heart fluttered with happiness at the sound of his voice, but at the same moment, she was sorry he had found her. Then she was sorry for being selfish and wanting to be alone. She was sorry for being gloomy, and she tried to muster a smile so he would know how happy she was to see him.

There hadn’t been a lot of time for her to be alone, sharing her thoughts or not with Pascal, not recently. She was with her busy parents whenever she could be, and with Eugene when she could be, and with Cassandra most of the time. It was a big change from before. She didn’t exactly _miss_ being alone, but she could admit to herself that the change felt not entirely comfortable. With someone always looking at her, she was saying “sorry” all the time for the mistakes she kept making.

Eugene hardly rocked the boat at all when he stepped in. He was always confident, always sure-footed. He was comfortable being the center of attention. Cass said that he should tone down his large personality, but Rapunzel disagreed. When he was with her, people watched him instead of her. Rapunzel felt so much relief when he was near, for that reason and more. 

He was always quiet enough with her. He never raised his voice at her; he never spoke harshly. They still fought about things, sometimes. Sometimes he complained loudly, like when she won at cards, but that was different. That wasn’t yelling, like when Gothel had yelled at her for doing something wrong that Rapunzel hadn’t known she was doing wrong.

Eugene made a joke. He said some things she knew he meant to cheer her.

“No one,” he said, “expects you to take it all in overnight.”

“But…” Rapunzel ventured in a small voice, “it hasn’t been overnight. It’s been months.”

Eugene half-stood and repositioned himself closer. Probably to hear her mumbling voice better, she thought. She sighed, then inhaled to repeat herself at regular volume.

“Months, smunths,” he said before she repeated her words. “It’s a lot to learn, even for someone as smart as you are. Finding out who you are, coming to terms with a really big truth, not to mention,” he touched her cheek, “having a dashing, debonair man of the world madly in love with you.”

“That’s the easiest part,” Rapunzel told him.

“Don’t be hard on yourself,” he said.

“O.K.”

“Sunshine.” He took her hand in his.

She didn’t want him to say that she was perfect just the way she was. He would say sweet things like that, and it made her happy in the moment to hear them, but she knew they weren’t really true, they were Eugene’s dream. In the same way, she felt Eugene was perfect, even though Cassandra was right whenever she enumerated Eugene’s personality flaws. “So, ‘man of the world,’” she said to change the subject, “tell me about one of the places you’ve been.”

Eugene’s eyebrows went up, and a lopsided grin rose on his face. He reached behind and tugged at the boat’s rope to loosen the hitch. “A good story deserves the right setting,” he said while he took his place at the oars. He pushed off and started rowing.

Rapunzel couldn’t resist smiling, even if she had tried to stay gloomy. It was exactly what she had wanted. Soon, they were away from land and out on the water, surrounded by reflected moonlight on relaxing, easy waves.

When they were at a distance from shore that felt far enough for privacy, Eugene pulled in the oars. “The Adventures of Flynn Rider,” he said, settling into a storytelling role, “as told by Eugene Fitzherbert.”

Rapunzel smiled encouragement, folded her hands on her knees, and gave him her attention.

“You know something? We haven’t been out here together since the lanterns. Your birthday,” he said.

“It’s nice out here,” Rapunzel answered him. She leaned back, her eyes following the winding of the Milky Way above. She turned at the waist, looking for the constellations that she couldn’t see from her balcony. The bright moon and the lights from the castle and town made it hard to spot them. “So quiet.”

Eugene patted the space beside him. “Why don’t you lean against me, so you can look up at the stars while I tell you this story?” he suggested.

Rapunzel was happy to move to the spot. She snuggled up against him, as closely as she could, and he helped by putting his arm around her. She pulled his arm against her stomach and leaned her head against his chest.

“There was the time,” Eugene started, and Rapunzel could feel his voice resonating in his chest, “when I was in Sømerland, enjoying an almost perfect existence in a little beach village. I would go out early every day in a boat like this, and just sit and enjoy the weather while the girls dove for pearls. Mostly it was small ones, seed pearls to decorate the gowns of queens. Big or small, they all went to the boss. Every now and again, the girls would bring up abalone or coral for me to sell on the side for a cut of the profit.”

“Did the boss know about it?” Rapunzel asked.

Eugene made an equivocating noise. “Those girls worked hard, they were skilled, and their uncle thought it was enough to keep them with a roof over their heads until they were married off. But that was all. The eldest was grown, and pretty as can be, but it was a small village. There just wasn’t anyone local to marry.

“Their uncle got all the pearls,” he said. “I supported the divers’ entrepreneurial spirit. No one got hurt.”

“Eugene,” Rapunzel sighed.

“Maybe this story wasn’t the best choice,” he said.

“Please don’t stop. I won’t interrupt again,” Rapunzel replied.

Eugene kissed the top of her head. “Interrupt all you want, Sunshine. You know you can ask me anything. I’ll give you the truth.”

Rapunzel trailed her fingers over Eugene’s thigh. “What happened next?” she prompted.

“One of the girls came up with a prize pearl,” he continued. “It was as big as a grape. Even more amazing, the girls found another one a few days later. The pearls matched so well that they could be sold as a pair for earrings.”

“You didn’t steal them, did you?”

“Hey!”

“Sorry.”

“I didn’t steal from those girls. If you want to know what happened to them, the next time you’re looking at that big book with the portraits of foreign kings and queens, take a close look at the Queen of Sømerland’s ears.”

“The pearl earrings?” Rapunzel asked with delight. “Those are the pearls your divers found?”

“The very ones,” Eugene said.

“Why did you leave Sømerland? It sounds like the dream you talked about once.”

“Minus the piles of money,” Eugene laughed. His laughter made Rapunzel’s leaning head bounce pleasantly.

Rapunzel ventured a scary question. “Was the pearl diver your girlfriend? The one you said was pretty?”

Eugene didn’t answer right away. His hand stroked her hair, and he brought his head down to touch hers. “It wasn’t a forever thing,” he said. “It was just something… something Flynn Rider did, charming ladies. I heard she married a sailor from Arendelle, after the pearls sold, and started a family.”

“Can a person have more than one dream at the same time?” Rapunzel ventured.

“What do you mean?” Eugene asked.

Rapunzel had given the idea hours of thought. When the lady’s maids and Cassandra left her at bedtime, she always stayed up until she couldn’t keep her eyes open. Nights alone on her balcony, looking at the stars through her telescope, she could feel the wideness of the sky. Even the wind seemed to whisper to her of places it had been, places she might see someday. “I always thought my one dream was to find out that those lights on my birthday were lanterns. It was my biggest dream.” She tipped her head to look up at Eugene. “You are my biggest dream, now.” She looked down at her hands. A spot of dried paint colored the tip of one of her fingers, under the fingernail. “You are. Though, in my tower, I daydreamed about things I didn’t dare to paint, because Gothel would get angry if she saw them. Running in the grass. People who understood my feelings, a hundred boys and girls to be friends with…” Rapunzel laughed softly. “I daydreamed about stepping out onto a cloud and finding them there, waiting for me. Before I learned that clouds were water droplets in air, anyway, not solid” she said.

Eugene lifted the arm not holding her to gesture around them. “This is your castle on a cloud. Everything you could possibly want,” he offered in a soft voice. “Trust me, this is as good as it can get. I slept on as many cold floors as warm beaches when I traveled the world. Sometimes I went without sleep, or went hungry. One time I ate nothing but tangerines for days. So sweet and juicy. That may not sound all that bad to you right now, but there are uncomfortable consequences to eating fruit and nothing else.” 

Rapunzel giggled at his tone, though she didn’t understand what he was implying. Then she remembered that she could ask; unlike Gothel, he wouldn’t call her stupid for asking. “What happens when you eat nothing but fruit?”

“There was no privacy on the ship. I didn’t make friends,” he said.

She still didn’t understand. She stayed silent, thinking.

Eugene finally clarified in low volume, “Bad bathroom things, Sunshine. Fruit goes right through you. And the smell! It was embarrassing. The commode was a bucket behind a curtain, in the ship’s hold where we also slept.”

“Oh, no,” she murmured. She tried not to laugh, but a giggle of sympathetic embarrassment bubbled out. Eugene laughed, too, which helped her not feel bad about laughing.

Eugene said, sounding bewildered, “I’m weirdly glad I can tell you something like that.”

“Is it weird?” she asked.

“It’s not the kind of thing I would normally tell a beautiful woman in my arms,” he answered. He punctuated the statement with an affectionate squeeze.

“You can tell me anything,” she said.

He stroked her short hair. “You’re my best friend. I’m not holding back.”

“Are you sure that’s a true statement?” she asked while twisting around. She repositioned herself so that she was leaning against him face to face. His arm stayed around her waist, but now his hand rested on the small of her back. She leaned in and kissed him. He met her kiss, and the kiss after that.

She wanted it to lead where their first kiss had led, this time without the panic and fear of almost losing Eugene forever. One kiss and then another, relief and happiness filling her and chasing out the despair she had felt when his eyes had closed and his words had faded away. Eugene had kissed and kissed her, and more, and finally had paused so he could lead her up the short stairs to her bed.

“Rapunzel,” Eugene said, there in the boat, as he gently put his hands on her shoulders and pushed their bodies apart. “We have to wait until we’re married.” The look on his face told her that he didn’t want to stop, either.

After the day she had been through, she couldn’t hide her disappointment. She bit her bottom lip so that she wouldn’t cry. “Why is it different now?” she ventured in a small voice.

“It just is,” Eugene answered. His hushed voice held the sound of longing. “But, hey,” he continued with mustered cheer that was still a little flat, “the wait won’t be forever. Once we’re Mr. and Mrs. Fitzherbert, we can… we _will_ make love as much as we want.”

Her smile tugged Rapunzel’s bottom lip free of her bite. “I’m going to like that,” she replied.

“So chin up,” he said. He crooked a finger and touched the underside of her jaw. Then he wiped the single tear in the corner of her eye away with his thumb. “It’s going to be a future full of rainbows, because you’re my Sunshine.” He grew serious. “OK?”

“OK,” she said. “Sorry.” She rubbed her hands over her arms.

Eugene reached for the oars. “You look cold. We should go back, now.” He took her silence for agreement, and angled the boat on a path back to the dock.

 

*

**Author's Note:**

> Cupcakes to you if you catch the 2 song references.


End file.
